Conflicting selection from fire and seed predation drives fine-scaled phenotypic variation in a widespread North American conifer
Abstract
We investigate selective agents acting on serotiny, a polygenic trait with high heritability and well-documented effects on community and ecosystem structure and function. We show that the frequency of serotiny in lodgepole pine across Yellowstone National Park, and likely over large portions of the Rocky Mountains, represents the balance of selection by two agents: fire and a seed predator, the American red squirrel. Thus, ecosystem structure and function in these ecosystems likely varies as a result of spatial variation in these two selective agents.
- Publication:
-
Proceedings of the National Academy of Science
- Pub Date:
- July 2014
- DOI:
- 10.1073/pnas.1400944111
- Bibcode:
- 2014PNAS..111.9543T